Morgan Sindall awarded major SEND school project in Kent

Morgan Sindall Construction’s Southern Home Counties business has been appointed by the Department for Education (DfE) to build the £27 million Inspire Academy, a brand-new specialist educational needs and disabilities (SEND) school in Gillingham, Kent.

The project was procured via the DfE framework and will see the creation of a two-storey new build school which will have places for 160 pupils.

Work is due to start onsite in August and once completed in spring 2028 the school will cater for 90 social, emotional, and mental health (SEMH) needs places, a specific category of SEND, and 70 places for pupils with autism spectrum disorders (ASD).

The school’s internal floor area will cover 3,671m². It will be split across 19 classrooms, a science laboratory, art room, design and technology workshop, an independent life skills teaching kitchen, dining hall, assembly hall, and offices. The school will feature quiet bays and calming areas connected to classrooms, hygiene rooms, shared teaching spaces, a sensory room, social spaces, and small group rooms.

Externally, Morgan Sindall will create play spaces, a multi-use games area (MUGA), and six raised planters so pupils can learn about food production by growing their own vegetables.

Designed in accordance with the DfE’s SEMH specifications, Inspire Academy will have more space per pupil than standard schools, a low arousal design to minimise sensory overload, and acoustic control measures to minimise noise.

There will be enhanced durability features including robust and tamper-resistant ironmongery, impact-resistant walls and doors, and smooth easy-clean surfaces. The school will also incorporate a range of security features including controlled access points, a secure perimeter, and CCTV.

To maximise social value generation, Morgan Sindall has set ambitious targets and will be working closely with local partners including Mid Kent College, Waterfront UTC, and Social Enterprise Kent. These targets range from employing a minimum of 30% local labour onsite, as well as bringing on board six T-Level students, six local apprentices, and 18 work placements. In addition, Morgan Sindall will be delivering ten careers and guidance events alongside carbon awareness training for those working on the project and for local pupils.

This work has already begun, with the project team delivering a careers talk at Mid Kent College so that pupils can learn about career opportunities in the construction sector. Due to its large number of SMEs and industrial businesses, Chatham has also been identified as a priority area for Morgan Sindall’s Just Transition initiative, which supports communities in the move towards decarbonisation.

The digital carbon reduction tool CarboniCa has been used to minimise the project’s carbon footprint, resulting in several key design changes with a total saving of 240 tonnes of CO2 emissions. This included removing a proposed photovoltaic (PV) canopy from the car park and replacing it with a higher-efficiency PV panel system on the school’s roof. This reduced 62 tonnes of embodied carbon by avoiding additional steel and construction materials while still meeting the energy generation requirements.

Other carbon reduction measures included reducing the concrete slab for the school’s foundation and ground floor and specifying that 40-50% of the steel comes from Electric Arc Furnace sources, which are more sustainable than traditional Blast Furnace steel. Following the school’s completion, CarboniCa will be used to measure the building’s sustainability performance against its target estimate.

To avoid damaging local biodiversity, Morgan Sindall has carried out an ecological survey of the school’s site and identified two protected species, common lizards and slow worms. Specialists have relocated the reptiles to a large, temporary fenced-in enclosure and installed perimeter fencing to prevent others entering the site. A monitoring period confirmed the area is now clear and the translocation site will remain a feature of the final scheme with knee high fencing and signage providing information on the reptiles.